""Never again," the Prime Minister dramatically declared, "We have learned the lessons of the past, and we will not allow any nation to put us through another Holocaust," he stated, and continued to talk, of course, about Iran.
We are used to hearing the Prime Minister talk about Iran, I thought to myself. The old 'Iran' is always brought up when he wants to prove Israel's strength or simply when he has nothing to say. And in any case, one sentence caught my attention: "We have learned the lessons of the past." And indeed, it seems that the Prime Minister was right, there is nothing more important than learning from the mistakes of the past and preparing for the future, and there is nothing more important than drawing lessons from the tragedies that have befallen the Jewish people and preventing their recurrence.
But then I thought about the great tragedy that occurred during the counting of the Omer: the death of twenty-four thousand disciples of Rabbi Akiva, the great and holy Tannaim who went to their earthly home because they did not show respect for one another. The Gemara does not write that they disrespected one another, but only that they did not show respect. They were busy studying, reciting Torah, and did not notice that they were not respecting their friends properly. Because of this sin, they all died and Torah was almost forgotten in Israel.
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Have we "learned from the lessons of the past"? Are we at least these days becoming stronger in matters that concern one another and refraining from slander and gossip?
Earlier this week, we were exposed to the many embarrassments that can result from spreading spin in WhatsApp groups, the speed of information, and the desire for primacy that often leads to the spread of misinformation at the speed of light to thousands of people who do not have the tools to verify the information. People died overnight and were resurrected, families entered the cycle of mourning and left after an hour, and the entire nation was shocked by the way a brother was informed of the passing of his brother.
Even if this is an extreme case, and an event that went beyond any line of logic, we cannot ignore the question of how many people have we 'killed' by passing information in groups? How many faces have we 'heartbroken' by spreading gossip? And how many families have we destroyed by passing slander?
Slander is more serious than murder, states the Chofetz Chaim, since with murder a person goes to his earthly home, but with slander a person carries the harm with him for life. And today? Many murderers of souls roam freely and they also have a new terminology: slander will be called 'slander', gossip will be called 'everything hot in the sector' and lies at best are 'spin'.
The idle conversations in the mikveh were transferred to WhatsApp groups, with one difference: in the mikveh, it takes courage to say things face to face, but on WhatsApp you can write 'copy and paste' at the bottom of the message and post anything that comes to mind.
During the municipal elections, I managed the campaign headquarters of one of the candidates, and I received messages from friends about news that was 'running in groups' to which I was required to respond - to explain or deny.
The desire to protect the client and stay informed led me to join several groups and become involved in the group discourse, until I found myself spending long hours in fruitless and meaningless arguments with teenagers who didn't know the city or the candidate at all, but had plenty of time to spread rumors and gossip. The fact that another person was paying for their entertainment didn't particularly bother them.
The elections are over and I have sobered up. I disconnected from the groups and reconnected with life, with one clear conclusion: WhatsApp groups drain both the battery, life, and a person's personality. In addition to the disregard for the commandments between one person and another, a person also becomes an unwilling slave to the media and anonymous, helpless people.
Precisely in these days of reckoning, when we are obligated to strengthen the commandments between man and man, I recommend to all readers of this column:
Disconnect!
Try one hour a day without WhatsApp and suddenly discover the world around you. Disconnect from the media and connect to life, and together we will succeed in preventing gratuitous hatred and increasing love and brotherhood among the people of Israel.
